- Author
- Cate Hall (Useful Fictions)
- Published
- 28 May 2025
- Kind
- Personal Substack essay built on one anecdote
- Original
- usefulfictions.substack.com/p/maybe-youre-not-actually-trying
- Subject
- Mind, attention and practice
- Themes
- Getting good
What it is
Cate Hall writes the Useful Fictions newsletter. The essay uses one personal episode to argue a general point. It asks readers to find where they are not Actually Trying.
What it says
- Hall says a stalker harassed the author for years. The author never revisited a low-point approach.
- Hall says the husband's strategies were ones the author would have chosen for someone else.
- The essay claims people are selectively agentic, not high or low agency everywhere. Most are stuck in one area of life.
- Hall splits life into three theaters: work, relationships with others, and relationship to self.
- Hall says people keep the resourcefulness they had when a problem first beat them.
- The essay says effort feels like trying, but struggle is not proof of full effort.
- Hall suggests asking if you treat yourself as well as you would a friend.
What evidence it gives
The main evidence is one personal story. It adds a hypothetical about a 32-year-old CTO with anxiety. It borrows the Alexander Technique idea of faulty sensory appreciation as an analogy. It offers no data or studies.
Interests and limits
The essay is opinion drawn from one life and Hall's own circle. A 2026 update notes the author sells a book on personal agency. The essay was read in full, but only two reader comments were loaded. The post describes harassment and threats in general terms.